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Saturday, August 31, 2013

EARLY ADAPTER

MOVIE REVIEW:

JOBS

By:

G.P. Manalo

Director:

Joshua Michael Stern

Starring:

Ashton Kutcher

Josh Gad

Dermont Mulrony

Ever since the late and great
Steve Jobs passed away 2 years ago, I’m pretty sure I was one of those people
who called the fact that they’ll make a movie about him. But a year later we
instead got a biographical novel by Walter Isaacson about his life. We can all
agree that after reading that novel, there is great potential that this will be
brought to life very well with the right people. This film is Joshua Michael
Stern’s shot at bringing one of the greatest innovators of our time be brought
to life in film for us to delve into the private life of Steve Jobs himself. Instead
we have a straightforward yet very simplified biography that tethers away on
the potentials of the different stories they are telling.

Conflicts and drama ensues
with Joshua Michael Stern’s Jobs as
it tell the real life story of Steve Jobs (a
surprising performance by Ashton Kutcher), beginning with him being a drop
out student into one of the greatest innovators and visionaries of the 20th Century.

Like most “true to life”/biographical
films the studios will obviously have liberties over that story. From past
biographical films, most changes do work and most of the time it would feel
genuine than it is “Hollywood-ized”. The problem with Jobs is that, the story
felt lacking. There was a scene where Ashton Kutcher quotes “let’s make the
small things unforgettable” and yet the film barely makes the big and small
ideas be what is promised.The film felt like one direct line and yet there is a large gap between
scenes that felt empty.

Unlike the Social Network
where the film would only tell the story of how the most popular social network
came to be and what happens to Mark Zuckerberg behind the scenes (or court
houses). Jobs, on the other hand tell everything in the range of 22 years of
Steve’s lifetime. The film is very ambitious on the significant events of Steve
Jobs’ life but instead the movie felt like they were rushed cliff notes; They
would bring up one idea and rush it to move on to another idea without any
impact to the story or the characters at all.

As an example the film
brings up his biological mother but instead the writing made it metaphorical
when he was under the influence of drugs as he look up to the clouds. Another
would be the Microsoft and Apple rivalry, a topic that could’ve been a large
plot point and an impact in Steve’s life would instead be done through a phone
call and soon enough the film never brought it up again (along with him
screwing over Apple’s founding members and his ex-wife along with his
biological daughter). There was never a sense of time as well. From the first
hour you’d be in 1974 and the next 20 minutes would be 1984 already. I never
felt Steve Jobs’ growth as a human being, I never felt the importance of the
company or why their tech matters (I dare you to drink every time they say IBM
in this movie), nor did I feel his relationship with the characters around him
because of how rushed the movie was. It would be both the directing or writing
fault of the film. Maybe it’s also because they don’t have the rights to the
biographical novel and they end up doing what they have.

Despite the film’s
lackluster story, the performances were just “alright”. Ashton Kutcher did a
good enough impression of Steve Jobs, just from the distinct walk and how he
say vowels was very much spot on, he played the Steve Jobs The Hippie Jesus just right but the businessman Steve Jobs - not so much. I would've liked to see Jason Schwartzman play him but Ashton Kutcher was still good in the role. I do like how he can do roles like this than being "the party guy" in every movie/tv show. There were numerous articles and even in the
book brought up on the times where he would lose his cool and how people would
label him as an “asshole” because of how hard he is to work with despite his
approachable appearance. It was done here in the movie but like most ideas of
the film that brings up, it wasn’t executed or handled properly. Him being an
asshole was overbearing in this film (it took over a huge portion of the film).
For the most part it was interesting but never did I feel the growth of the
person because of the large gaps of the film. I think the other ones who stood
out in this movie as well were Josh Gad, Dermont Mulrony and even J.K. Simmons.

Jobs has potential to be one
of the best true to life stories/biopics especially with all of the material it
is carrying, instead the film took a rather lazy route for it to rushed and
unexplained, though the performances did save this from being a bigger disaster.
If you’re an Apple fan and want to know more about Steve Jobs, I suggest you
buy Walter Isaacson’s biographical novel than seeing this. If you were patient
for the releases of the Iphone's new generation every year then I’d wait on something worth your while for
a second generation of a Steve Jobs film written by Aaron Sorkin, adapted from
the book by Isaacson with Steve Wozniak’s seal of approval for that project.